


The Professor and the Student

by CaptainJZH



Category: Original Work
Genre: College, Gen, Professors, Students, Written for a Class
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:42:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26663869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainJZH/pseuds/CaptainJZH
Summary: Professor Ribbentrop didn't like teaching — he'd rather be writing his magnum opus novella. After successfully driving away most of his students, one remains, threatening his much-desired free time.
Kudos: 2





	The Professor and the Student

George sat in his office, idly watching the word processor’s cursor blink steadily on the still-blank page. It took him an hour, but he had finally decided on a title for what was to be his magnum opus. His first novel. The novel to end all novels. The greatest story ever told (“Move over Bible,” he told himself). He would call it, “The Story.” Short, sweet and to the point. Not like those pretentiously long-titled books like  _ A Fault in Our Stars  _ or  _ To Kill A Mockingbird.  _ In his opinion, they would have worked better as  _ A Fault  _ or  _ To Kill.  _ His novel, according to his boasts, would move mountains, stop rivers, level forests… 

Or at least, that’s what he’d been telling himself for the past forty years. In that time, he’d “started” his novel on notepads, typewriters, an IBM PC, Windows 95, Windows Vista, Windows XP and so on, until he finally settled on Google Docs. Which didn’t mean much since he made the same amount of progress every time, but he claimed it was good to “freshen” his mind. And this time, it seemed to be working. Finally, a rush of motivation flowed to his brain, as his fingertips flew to the keyboard.

Then he noticed the time.

“2:55?!” George exclaimed, nearly falling backwards out of his chair.

The middle-aged man grabbed his coat and ran out of the office, darting down the hall. Today was the first day of the semester at Stuart University, a reasonably decent school with too high an acceptance rate, if George had any say in the matter. Which, as a tenured professor, he thought he should have. He’d been teaching there for ten years, but as far as George was concerned, it was just a stepping stone for his upcoming novelist career. Every year, he told himself that this would be the year he made it big and retired. Soon, the name “G.Z. Ribbentrop” would be known across the literary world, he imagined.

But today, he was just “Professor Ribbentrop.” No book signings sat in his future. Just a lecture hall. The same damp, musty lecture hall as every semester, filled with too many students who wouldn’t  _ shut the hell up. _

“Okay, class,” he tried to say over the loud side-conversations. “Class?  _ Class!” _ Finally they quieted down. “Welcome to English 101, I’m Professor Ribbentrop and…” Then he remembered. He forgot to write a syllabus for this class.  _ “Shit,”  _ he muttered. “Okay, uh, if you’ll open your textbooks to… Page 1000… You’ll see a review… Do that, and, uh… It should have everything you learned in English 100.”

Students began to cry out in confusion.

“But there is no English 100!”

“Or a page 1000!”

George didn’t care. “I’ll be right back!” he hollered as he burst out of the classroom, running back to his office. He just had to print out last year’s syllabus and read up on the course curriculum on his way back.

But by the time he got back, George soon discovered, nearly a third of the 60-person class had left. At first he thought they had merely gone to the bathroom, but even after handing out the syllabus, he realized that they were gone for good. 

An idea formed in George’s head: If everyone in his class dropped out, he would have all the time in the world for novel writing, surely!

And so he got to Bad Teaching. He would talk as quietly as possible and write on the board in barely-comprehensible writing to start, followed by long reading assignments, random writing assignments and wild deviations from the syllabus. By the end of the first class, everyone was gone. He thought he won.

Then Wednesday came. George’s second day of class, he began it in a good mood, walking through the sunny campus with a spring in his step as he walked towards the lecture hall. Sure, he wasn’t expecting any students, but he figured a large, empty room would be a good place to get some writing done.

“Here!” an excited voice rang out the second he entered the classroom. George’s head shot up, spotting a young woman in a bright, neon sweater sitting in the back of the room. “Sorry, thought you were taking attendance. Ha!”

George quickly shuffled over to his computer, pulling up the attendance sheet and spotting a blemish in his otherwise-empty class roster. Kathy Winslow was the young woman’s name, and she had signed up for the class late. Because  _ of course  _ she did.

“...Kathy Winslow?” he asked, hoping this was some sort of mistake.

“Here!” she repeated, her hand shooting up into the air.

“And you’re here for English 101?”

“Yup! Was on a waitlist since May, but then the class suddenly got a ton of open spots so I got automatically registered!”

“Yeah, how about that…” George muttered. This wasn’t going to be easy, he thought. But if he could get 60 students to walk out of a required literature course, he could definitely do the same for Kathy Winslow.

Kathy’s hand shot up again. “Yes?” George sighed.

“Did I miss anything on Monday?”

“...Yes. It’s all online, though.”

Oh, it would be online alright. The whole syllabus, assignment list, all of it. Online only. Not that anyone without a computer science degree could access it, of course. He barely understood the school website, himself. A simple freshman would never be able to navigate such a maze of dead links and bad web design, he figured.

Then Kathy did just that.

“How the fuck…” he muttered as she handed in the first week’s assignments in next class.

“It was confusing,” Kathy shrugged, “but I’m persistent.”

“I’m sure you are,” George remarked. “Anyway…  _ War & Peace _ . All of it. Chapter by chapter notes… Due tomorrow.”

“Okay!” Kathy exclaimed. “How long do the notes have to be?”

“...10 pages. Single spaced. Each.”

“Okay!”

Then, next class, Kathy handed in a 3,600-page compilation of chapter-by-chapter responses to War & Peace. Which were actually quite insightful, if George was being honest.

“Call my bluff, huh?” he muttered as he built his lesson plan. “Well let’s see how you like it when I turn up the heat.”

He would talk slowly and recite Shakespeare in a dull monotone. He would show boring documentaries on the life of J.D. Salinger. He assigned essay after essay, book after book. He debated not showing up to class, or grading her assignments all A’s, but then everyone would want to talk his class next semester. He didn’t want to be known as the “easy” professor. Except no matter what he threw at Kathy, she continued to excel, almost without effort, it seemed. One day, he asked her why.

“Why the hell are you still here?” George asked the young woman, diligently taking down everything he said. She stopped writing, realizing that the professor was addressing her.

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, don’t play dumb with me. This class sucks. I suck. But you’re still here. You could have dropped this class weeks ago!”

“But why would I do that?”

“Surely there are  _ other  _ English teachers?! Other classes? Online classes? Correspondence courses? Why this one?”

“Because I like reading and writing,” Kathy said, matter-of-factly, “And you like reading and writing, too. Because why else would you be teaching an English class?”

George was silent for almost a full minute, before finally speaking.

“Class dismissed.”

The next day, he was back in his office, staring back at the blank page of his would-be novel. A knock came at his door.

“Mr. Ribbentrop?” Kathy asked. “I’m here for your office hours?”

“Oh, oh right, I forgot,” George remembered, shaking his head. “Uh, what brings you here?”

“I know it’s not for your class, but I was hoping you could look over this story I wrote?”

George paused, looking between his blank document and the earnest young woman standing in front of him. He sighed. “Sure,” George smiled. “I’d love to.”

“And if you need any help with...that,” Kathy said, gesturing towards his computer screen. “I’d be happy to give you some ideas in return.”

George smiled. “I just might take you up on that, Miss Winslow. I just might.”


End file.
